


the end of infinity

by KIBITZER



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Character Study, Introspection, Major spoilers for Silver Snow, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-12
Updated: 2019-10-12
Packaged: 2020-12-13 16:31:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21000740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KIBITZER/pseuds/KIBITZER
Summary: There is a great crossroads in her mind. A moment where the path before her abruptly splits into two, like a river cleft by a stone.She stands before it, unmoving.





	the end of infinity

There is a great crossroads in her mind. A moment where the path before her abruptly splits into two, like a river cleft by a stone.

She stands before it, unmoving. The two paths call to her, each trying to sell itself as sweeter than the other. They sing, they beg, they beckon and cry, pleading with her to choose, to take one of them as her own—and she stands as if rooted in place, unable to take even a single step forwards.

There is a figure standing on each path; similar in visage to one another. Her own face feels blank when she looks at them.

Seiros stands to her left, hard as iron and adorned in gold. In her hands she holds the Sword, that awful thing with its yawning hole where Mother’s heart once was.

Rhea stands on the right. She has nothing to her name, and no adornments on her person. Draped in plain white cloth like a newborn, she clasps her hands in front of herself as if in prayer.

The person standing before them, before this fork in the road, cannot seem to recall her own face. She doesn’t know which name was hers. She doesn’t know.

The two figures look at her; then each other. They open their mouths to speak.

**Seiros remembers:**

The first time she saw the Professor, it had felt like being robbed of air. She knew immediately—who this was, and what resided within them.

Her mind was consumed by the thought of them. She must awaken their potential as the vessel. She must unlock their soul from their body, empty the container and let new blood flow to fill it; she must destroy this—this Byleth, whoever they were, and make room.

She could set right this unjust, off-kilter world. She could make right what went so terribly wrong, and return a broken world to how it should be. She must. It was her one duty. And then, once it was done, she would finally, _finally_ feel better.

The Professor’s face had betrayed nothing on that day. Their face was blank as they stared back up at her. Had something in them recognized her, or was that merely a pipe dream?

In any case: it was time for decisive action. The thirteenth vessel, so long thought to have been lost, had returned according to its own fate. It must be true, then, that this fusion of blood and magic truly did contain splendor worthy of the progenitor god. It must be true. And so, she must ensure it stayed; she must tend to its growth with a careful hand, and facilitate destiny’s course.

The Professor was a docile dog. They did as they were told, without question or complaint. They worked tirelessly if she told them to. They rested if she told them to. They did everything without a single thought spared, like a machine.

**Rhea argues:**

Byleth was never a machine. Their emotions were subtle, but always there. When she spoke with them, Byleth would sometimes seem to shine; a sparkle deep in those abyss-blue eyes that told of vast humanity inside.

They were pragmatic, yes. Efficient. Work-oriented to a fault. She never mistook Byleth for a person with much empathy to spare. They had a head for logic and strategy, and a heart that could withstand reality. They did their job, whatever it may be, without as much as a grimace.

But that did not mean Byleth was not human. They weren’t unfeeling; they were not unthinking. They often did not speak; that did not mean they were not communicating.

She remembered vividly the first time she invited Byleth to meet privately, in her own quarters. She had felt nervous somehow, nervous and excited. She wondered if they would even show up.

Of course they had; Byleth did as they were told. But their conversation in that room had felt different.

“When we speak in this room, just the two of us, you are not addressing the Archbishop, but simply Rhea.”

It had been a dangerous sentiment to express.

She had not herself understood that until far later.

**Seiros reminisces:**

The Professor progressed magnificently. She gained their trust. Foolish mercenary; foolish vessel, ignorant of its fate.

They wielded the Sword with natural grace, as though the weapon had always been theirs. The Stone inside of them shone like a star. The blade was truly, rightfully theirs.

Sometimes, in their words, there seemed to be hidden a shard of Divinity. Like God’s memories leaking into the Professor’s head. They seemed to know, by hunch and guess, exactly what she wanted to hear.

It was progressing well.

Oh, to see them changed—that day they returned from the Sealed Forest, washed green and pale in the moonlight, aglow with divine power.

It took its toll on the Professor, but she found herself not quite caring. She held them gently, singing to them until they awoke—her mother’s song. She searched their face for a hint, for even the subtlest sign of Her, and found sorely little. She brushed their hair from their face and reassured them.

To the tomb, next. To hollow them out and invite justice back into the world.

She could not afford to falter here. Everything was lining up perfectly. She paced her chambers with manic energy, didn’t take food or even sleep for almost an entire moon.

The Professor was none the wiser. They still came to her, for private talks and advice and lessons in magic or swordplay. Was that Her, inside there, tethering the Professor to the Archbishop? Was that recognition? Was that God’s heart, spilling its feelings into the vessel, contaminating the human spirit?

**Rhea laments:**

If only those days at the monastery could have lasted forever. If only time would have stopped, that she and Byleth could have eternity.

Oh, it was dangerous; she was in love with them and with her life, her half-life that was never meant to be real. In love with the vessel that she herself was meant to destroy.

They treated her so kindly. It was tangible kind of care, one that she had been lacking for a thousand years. It was so easy to forget herself. To indulge in it. There was a hole in her heart, and her plans had not succeeded in filling it; but the support and affection from Byleth, real and alive and tangible, was a salve for her wound. 

Inside her were two forces battling for dominance; they each had a name, and a will. One of them was not meant to have a say. But she may find herself fighting to have it.

Byleth always spoke to her as rhea, not as the Archbishop, not as the eldest saint of the Church. They didn’t know who she was. They only saw rhea, who had never been seen.

She was in love but must suppress herself and forge ahead.

**Seiros speaks:**

Mother did not come. The vessel remained an empty vessel. Failure stung deep, but she did not have time to savor it.

**Rhea speaks:**

Had she felt relief or sorrow?

**Seiros snaps:**

Failure was no friend to her. She posed her ultimatum to the vessel and knew deep inside that if it betrayed her, she would break. That thirteen failures was all she could stomach.

The door to her own demise was opened.

**Rhea soothes:**

Byleth closed it. 

**Seiros speaks:**

The following battle was hard. She fought with every last scrap of strength in her body. To repel the Empire. To salvage her work. To keep the vessel from going to waste.

It was not to be.

She was beaten. Swarmed by foes. They held her down, claws gouging between scales and armor plates, finding soft flesh beneath to shear into. She howled and roared and thrashed but none of it could stop that horrible sight from coming to pass.

The vessel vanished, right before her eyes, into the abyss below.

**Rhea speaks:**

Byleth fell, and the monastery with them.

They had screamed like she never heard them scream before. It was fear, and it transplanted itself through her like poison. Vile to the ears. She thrashed to be free, to help them—to no avail.

She struggled until she ran out of strength.

Once she was exhausted, it was easy for the Empire to drag her away.

She fought as best as she could, with what infinitely little power she had left: once they deemed her too much trouble, she was beaten unconscious.

**Seiros speaks:**

She spent five long years under the hand of the Adrestian Empire. They stripped her of her titles and confined her in the darkness to rot. Each day was a trial; a torment; a test of faith.

She believed it all lost. The Professor was gone; her dream lay shattered at the bottom of the chasm that swallowed them.

Time passed slowly, those five years. Most weeks she was lucky just to see another person. She was fed, but only barely enough to stay alive. They had her trapped and muzzled. She received no news, no goodwill, no reprieve.

It was enough to drive a person mad. Stronger people than her had succumbed to less.

But the one thing that kept her focused was anger. Was hate. Was—

**Rhea cuts in:**

Was Byleth.

She thought about them, every day, tirelessly hoping against hope that they would come, that they would save her. She refused to believe them dead. She refused it. And because she refused it, she was able to hold herself together. The mere dream of Byleth existing, of Byleth remembering her and coming to rescue her, held her identity together.

Oh, how she yearned for them; for their subdued laugh, for those clear eyes, for the sense of being seen. She longed for those long-gone monastery days; when Byleth would come to her as often as they could make time, to spend even just a few moments in her company. She remembered the gifts they brought her; flowers and trinkets and things that reminded her of home. She remembered every piece of advice they asked for, and every one they gave her in return.

Longing alone carried her though those years. Kept her raw and sane, kept her head above water.

And then, without warning, the Empire fell, right above her head.

The walls shook and for the first time in five years the door slammed wide open, secrecy blown apart as multiple sets of booted feet scuffed the floor of the hidden passage. She heard voices; familiar ones.

And then she saw them, as if time had never touched them. As if not a day had gone by since their fall, since that awful parting. Byleth did not look a day older; yet they looked tired somehow, weary and drawn as if weighed by an unseen burden. 

It lifted as soon as they laid eyes on her. The fog behind their eyes cleared.

Byleth couldn’t get the cell open fast enough. Their movements had been so frantic. Desperate.

They reeked of blood and sweat and carbon and iron but she had still fallen into their arms and clung to them more tightly than she thought herself capable of. Byleth sank to their knees, bringing them both down to sit on the floor, as though their legs had no more strength to give. They held her hard enough to bruise but she had only felt thankful for it—because it was the only way to make her brain truly believe that it was real.

**Seiros laments:**

There was an absence of Her in it. It was only the Professor.

**Rhea exclaims:**

But it was real. It was Byleth. She had been saved. By her beloved. By her Byleth.

**Seiros says:**

The Professor was never the important one.

**And Rhea confesses:**

But they were the only one for her.

**Seiros continues:**

The Professor held her so tightly, their face buried in her neck, and hers in theirs. It was only when she felt the water that she realized the Professor was crying.

They kept whispering to her, over and over:

“Rhea. I missed you, Rhea. I was so scared. I missed you. I’ve been looking for you for so long. Rhea. _Rhea.”_

It was a nail in the coffin.

**Rhea says:**

Slowly, she coaxed Byleth to release her, so they could look at one another. She had never seen them cry like this. 

“It’s all right,” she had told them, caressing their face, wiping their tears away, as if she herself was not also crying. “It’s all right.”

**There is a pause. Seiros denies the following actions as her own. Therefore, Rhea says:**

She brushed Byleth’s hair from their face, tucking strands of pale green behind their ear, unable to stop herself touching them. Their breath was uneven and fast in a way that didn’t suit their stoic personality. But they looked her in the eyes so ardently, with such a sublime mix of relief and joy and adoration. They said her name a dozen, a thousand times.

Both of them on their knees on the floor in front of each other, like in mutual prayer; unwilling to let each other go even as minutes passed them by.

She did not have words. It was rare for her to find herself at a loss. Words were her weapon; her tools of the trade, her offense and defense.

In lieu of words, she had taken their face into her hands; they had silently agreed, pulling her in mutually, hands on her neck and side. The kiss they shared was laced with salt and iron, but to her it seemed like honey and wine. 

**Unable to bear it, Seiros snarls:**

She was turning her back on victory. She was ruining everything. She was a sentimental fool with her broken heart caught in a cruel trap. She was an idiot, turning her back on destiny. Turning her back on Mother. Turning her back on ever feeling okay again.

She was risking everything to gain nothing. She was playing with sentimentality instead of focusing. She was gambling everything, everything, everything—throwing it all away like it meant nothing.

She was straying.

So she pulled herself back, she broke the embrace, she remembered herself. She remembered her proper name. The name the Professor never called her by.

She remembered her goal, her dream, her destiny.

But she was unable to destroy that yearning; unable to wrench that parasite from her own heart, that disgusting longing for the _vessel_.

**Rhea muses:**

It felt like she was dying.

**Seiros adds:**

It was impossible to move forward.

**Rhea says:**

It was divine.

To be seen.

To be known.

To be called by one’s own name. 

**Seiros says:**

It was vile. It reeked of failure.

Suddenly the shell wanted a say.

**Rhea is silent for a long time. Then:**

Yes, she was a shell identity. She was never real. She was not supposed to be a person. She herself was a mere vessel; a hideout for a saint. She was a shell, a flickering existence designed to only burn for a few decades before being killed and replaced by a new archbishop.

Many before her. Many after her.

A mere shell.

Byleth did not know this. Byleth drew so near to her and never realized they were talking to someone not meant to exist. Byleth accepted the shell as its own being and treated it like a person, treated it with care, with love.

They called it by its name and meant it. They did not know any better.

She was the first shell that had ever stood a chance. The others had not been recognized like this. The others had not yearned to live. Had not been given a chance to yearn. They had been puppets and masks and shells—not true people.

Byleth saw her as a person.

Only now did she understand why their private conversations had been so dangerous. Why she had been a fool to convince them that in private she was merely rhea. Merely a woman. Merely herself. Merely—

rhea was not supposed to live. There wasn’t meant to ever be a chance for her.

And yet, Byleth gave her that chance without even knowing it.

**Seiros flicks her wrist and the Sword parts into its segments, vertebrae hanging loose along the cable. She holds it up, sickening in its length, demanding to be heard when she speaks:**

She had forgotten and turned her back on Mother. Did it not haunt her every sleepless night? Did failure not drive her mad? What was the point in indulging in this poison?

What dream was this? It was certainly never one of hers.

**Rhea, looking away, continues the story:**

The siege on Shambhala would be far too dangerous. She must go. She must protect Byleth, at any cost—indeed, even if that cost was to be her own life.

She may never forget Byleth’s expression when she told them as much.

The two of them had barely spoken since her rescue; she had remained in her chambers, with Seteth guarding the door, ensuring she felt safe enough to rest.

Little did he know, she was at war with herself; unable to find peace.

She told Byleth she came to protect them. Even at the cost of her life. Their face twisted into unspeakable grief, the likes of which she had never seen; eyes shining in the dull light with tears they refused to spill. Their answer was clear:_ I won’t let you. _

**Seiros whips the Sword back into a solid blade and says:**

Finally she was in equilibrium. Finally she was in agreement. Every part of her, for one reason or another, was ready to fight and kill and die to protect the Professor.

It gave her strength to journey on, even in her ragged body; it gave her strength to leap in front of a rain of missiles.

She had been furious. Desperate. She wheeled through the sky knowing that one wrong move would spell not only her own death, but theirs.

But for the sake of the vessel, for the sake of her Mother, she would not make a single mistake.

She had fallen, through air scorching hot from the explosions. Her scales peeled away as if torn by the speed. She was exhausted, and burnt, and all inside her were broken things, ruptured things, bleeding things.

She can not remember hitting the floor. Perhaps she was already dead then—perhaps she willed herself to return to life, turning her back on whatever is beyond. She must have, because she remembers when the Professor seized her body, turning her over to look at her, and found her breathing.

There was nothing of Mother in their arms, in their eyes. They looked at her and did not see her. They only saw rhea. That parasite; that shell; that waste of thought.

**Rhea soothes:**

But she had protected them. She had protected the dream. At any cost.

Her halves were in agreement.

**Seiros is silent. Eventually:**

No. It was unbearable to watch.

And she knew she would have to choose.

Two paths lay before her.

The fork in the road is a simultaneous representation of two choices.

She must not only choose between Byleth and Mother—she must also, in some way, choose between Rhea and Seiros.

Which of them will be happy, and which of them will prevail, and which of them will have to yield at the end of the chase—

Oh, it’s coming to a head. Its going to her head. It’s boiling inside her skin. She doesn’t have much time left. Faintly, as if through someone else’s recollection, she can hear herself: screaming and thrashing, the sounds of battle, of a thousand voices crying out for victory.

She exists inside her own head. Someone else is in control of the body; a pure raw undercurrent of animal instinct. Of beast and wrath. She’s inside her own head and she’s not in control.

The Immaculate One cares little for choices. It cares not for love or bonds or dreams. It’s indiscriminate destruction. Friend and foe are human concepts.

It’s the first time she can remember losing control like this. She supposes that, at the end of the journey, she has finally run out of strength. That she has no more to give. Too weak to even control her own blood. The Immaculate One is a howling beast; it wants to kill, it knows little but blind rage, and with how splintered she is she cannot take the reins from it.

The two standing before her—Rhea and Seiros—beckon to her. All around them, their collective body is waging war on their allies.

A choice has to be made.

The Immaculate One, having received a grave wound, flees the battlefield. It soars high above, wresting itself from gravity’s pull with a massive heave. It’s blood falls like globs of rainwater from its wounds, its flight uneven and strained as it heads toward the ruined monastery.

Byleth is following on foot below.

The Immaculate One crashes into the cathedral itself. Bottle-green blood splatters the stained-glass windows and all the rubble and the delicate tiled floor when the massive beast hits solid stone wall. It thrashes, blindly, and falls to the floor like a broken bird, wings pathetically twisting for air. It screams; in fury or in pain or in fear, as its life bleeds out in rivers.

An explosion of scales disintegrates the beast’s form just as the Professor comes running in. The Sword clatters noisily to the floor as Byleth sprints to catch her in their arms, light as a feather.

The white scales in the air are like flower petals, or maybe a swirl of silver snow, drifting about as if in slow motion. The Professor’s arms are strong; secure.

And somehow,

for the first time,

it doesn’t

_feel_

like them.

She forces her eyes open. Her vision is blurry and unfocused; her brain is heavy. It’s like her thoughts are leaking out along with her blood. But she forces her eyes open and she strains to look and for the first time in a thousand years she beholds true Divinity.

There is no doubt: those are Mother’s eyes, and Her embrace, warm as it ever was. Her gaze is accepting, is loving, is tender and real and _here_.

If she had the strength to, she would cry. Her breath hitches. _Mother. _

And slowly, as her consciousness dims, Mother’s presence seems to fade. Like dye washed out by a stream, the color of Her is pulled away and diluted into the very air around them. Certainly, She was here, for but a moment; now, She is everywhere.

And then the world entirely goes black and velvet-soft.

She has made mistakes. She has made horrible, irreparable, unforgivable mistakes. She is a liar; a murderer; a spiral of death and deceit contained in one humanoid form. She selfishly used the entire world for her own gain, manipulating and lying and killing relentlessly to have her way.

And, somehow, she has survived.

She does not deserve that. Every breath that flows through her lungs is unearned. No doubt the world scorns her for it; that she has lived and so many have not. That she has murdered her way to this point and come out with a heart still beating. She is a monster, through and through.

She has to see Byleth. She must speak with them. She must go to her confession and beg for forgiveness.

She does not think it will be given.

In the face of this truth, she is oddly calm. She is convinced of it: that she will lose it all, there and then, that Byleth will not as much as look at her once it is done. She will make her choice and lose everything.

Yes: she would understand it well if no one wanted to even speak to her after what she has done. She understands deeply that most surely wish her dead. And she fully grasps the idea that Byleth is the same.

But it is the right thing to do.

She has made her choice. She can not run from this. She can not run from the past any longer, nor from the truth.

Even now, some traitorous hope inside her pleads the world for mercy; that Byleth will take her to their side and accept her, support her, love her.

She knows it is foolish.

She must go, and face them honestly, and take their rejection like a human. She must. It is the right thing to do. And they are in the right to hate her.

Her wounds have still not healed. It feels like dragging a corpse around when she makes her way to see Byleth. But she has to see them. She has to talk to them. To confess and repent and beg, _beg _for relief.

Rhea has made her choice. Even if it costs her everything, she loves Byleth too much. She chooses them, she chooses them, even if it is a raw and painful path, even if she will only lose them.

Because it’s the right thing to do.

Because what Byleth has given her was more than could ever be obtained by chasing a ghost. Because the hole in Rhea had already been filling itself with human support and affection and trust.

Rhea has made her choice. She stands with the weight of the world on her shoulders, but she is standing. She’s made her choice and will not go back.

Now Byleth will make theirs.


End file.
